Process of bending wood



June 2, 1936. A. AALTO PROCESS OF BENDING WOOD Filed NOV. 8, 1954 Fig. 1.

. lhl flv I'OR Alarm/Adria Patented June 2, 1936 UNITED STATES PATENT- OFFICE 2,042,916 PROCESS OF BENDING WOOD Alvar Aalto, Helsinki, Finland 7 Application November 8, 1934, Serial No. 752.170

In Great Britain November 8, 1933 V 1 Claim (Cl. 144-4309) According to the present invention the wood is split or slotted longitudinally into separate layers with free ends and interleaved with other strips more or less perpendicularly to the plane of the bend, so that the layers slide over one another during bending, and the layers are then secured in the new relationship preferably by gluing so Jtshadils ythey retain the desired form when the glue The invention is illustrated by the accompanya ing drawing, wherein:

Figure 1 shows a piece of straight wood at the areato be bent after cuts have been made in the end but before bending.v and Figure 2 shows the same bent in accordance :5 with the invention. The drawing illustrates the production of an approximately right angledbend suitable, for example, tor the top of a furniture leg for securing under a seat, table top or the like. In produc- 80 ingsuchabendthewoodlisplaccdinabending device and longitudinal saw cuts 2 are made extending in from theend. The cutspreferably extend diiierent distances, one or more pos sibly to beyond the further end of the area where the bend is to be made and others not quite so far'. Pieces 3 of thin material, preferably wood (for instance strips of veneer) are fitted and glued in the resulting slots: while the glue 4 is still wet 5 the whole is bent to the required form as indicated at Figure Land when the glue is dry the wood retains its bent form.

Altematlvely, two pieces of wood might be slotted and after cutting-the resultant layers 10 required to form the bend to their bent lengths when interleaved with the layers of the other piece the gluing and bending process can be-carried out similarly.

Numerous other forms can be made in which 15 a portion of the solid wood is cut into separate layers and interleaved with other strips over the area of a bend prior to bending,'and the laminationssecured in their resulting relationship, but the above example should sufllce for an understand- 0 ing'of thenature of the invention.

I claim: a A process of forming bent articlesoi wood, con= sisting in slotting a portion of a piece of solid woodilongitudinaliy from an end to form sep- 25 aratelayers, interleaving said layers with thin strips, placing adhesive between said strips and said layers, bending the composite structure thus formed in a plane approximately perpendicular to the planes of said layers and holding it until said adhesive has set suiliciently to maintain the bend.

ALVAR AALTO. 

